


It's not the end, my friend. Not just yet.

by pancakestiel



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Destiel - Freeform, High School, M/M, One Shot, Talking About The Future, Talking about college, Teen AU, Teen Angst, Teen Castiel, Teen Dean Winchester, Teen Romance, seniors
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-25
Updated: 2015-05-25
Packaged: 2018-04-01 06:17:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,752
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4009030
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pancakestiel/pseuds/pancakestiel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean takes a break to think about his life and ends up calling Castiel over for a little chat. Turns out that hanging out at old playgrounds at night can lead to some serious conversations. Luckily, conversations with happy endings.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's not the end, my friend. Not just yet.

The evening was warm enough to sit around in a t-shirt and shorts but Dean didn’t do shorts, or so he said, so he opted for jeans just like he did every day. He was the only one at the old playground so he chose to sit on the old swings instead of the bench. There were only a couple of benches, an old sand pit and a swing set left.

For whatever reason Dean felt slightly nostalgic and somewhat melancholic that night and the place he was at only helped bring on the mood. He sat there with a six-pack of cheap beer (that he had managed to convince a friend to get for him) carelessly laying by his feet and wondered how the hell he had managed to get all the way through to his high school graduation. Most people thought he wasn’t capable of pulling that off on his own because Dean was always the one to pretend not to care. He had always seemed to be willing to do anything to maintain his reputation and his attitude in most cases made him look like a brat, even if he was actually one of the most caring people out there and definitely not a stupid person.

Following that train of thought Dean ended up with an image of a certain person on his mind. Castiel. The boy in the bumblebee shorts who had managed to get lost on the first day of school all those years ago. Dean’s best friend since that day and for the past couple of years his boyfriend as well.

Thinking of graduation brought on thoughts about the end of one of the parts of life. Which, again, lead to thoughts of another ending. Surely Castiel was going to run off to some fancy college and Dean would just end up stuck in the same town, at least until his brother’s graduation because it was where he needed to be. Despite what it may have seemed Dean was insanely proud of Castiel and wanted him to get as far as he possibly could. He knew Cas would get into any school he’d want to be in, not just because he was crazy smart but also because of how much hard work he’d put in to get to where he was at that point. They had yet to talk about what would happen to their relationship after the summer but Dean had a bad feeling about it. He’d always had a hard time letting go but he thought he’d try for Castiel. If that’s what he’d want, of course.

After sitting around for over an hour and with the third bottle of beer in his hand, Dean decided to finally settle things once and for all. He sighed and got his phone to send Cas a text, asking for a meeting at the old playground. Dean half smiled when the reply came no more than a minute later. Castiel was always crazy about replying right away. The message said Castiel would be there shortly so Dean sat there and waited. It was already dark but there was still nearly an hour till midnight so Castiel had no problem getting out of the house. Not that he’d ever had a curfew anyway.

About ten minutes later Dean could see someone walking towards him with a flashlight in their hand. “ _What a dork_ ,” Dean thought and chuckled softly.

“Cas, babe, it’s not that dark,” he called, getting back a well-earned scoff.

“I would agree with you if I were a cat. Sadly, I’m not,” Castiel replied.

Dean watched him walk up to the swing set, frown at the alcohol and take the free seat to his left. He took another sip of the beer and swallowed with a frown on his face. “Man, don’t ever buy cheap beer. It sucks ass,” he said. Castiel didn’t answer to that but simply shook his head. “So why are you here now? Is something wrong?”

Dean almost felt guilty for asking Castiel to walk all the way to the playground for no good reason other than his own worries. “Nah, I was just thinking.”

“Thinking? About what? Are you alright?” Castiel asked.

Dean shrugged. “Sure.”

Castiel nodded and after that they both sat in silence for a while. Somewhere along the way Castiel had picked up a bottle of beer and started sipping on it. That was when Dean spoke.

“You know, there’s only a couple of weeks till we graduate,” he pointed out.

“I know.”

“And summer’s gonna go by real quick. You know how it is,” Dean continued.

Castiel nodded, looking at Dean intently. Dean knew Castiel would’ve been looking at him up close if it wasn’t for the darkness around them. Cas’ flashlight was off.

“And you’re gonna go to college.”

Castiel frowned at that. “I know. You’re coming with me.”

Dean shook his head, making Castiel frown a little deeper. “Nah, I’m staying here. At least until Sammy’s done with school.”

“Oh. I see.”

Castiel started picking at the label on the bottle. He’d been planning to ask Dean to come with him so they could perhaps get an apartment together. Clearly that wasn’t an option anymore. Not that Dean knew of it ever being an option in the first place. Dean stayed quiet for another minute but then decided to get it all out in the open. He closed his eyes and blurted out the question that seemed to have been chewing on his brain for the past week or so.

“Should we break up now or wait until after graduation?”

It took Castiel a few seconds to finally react. “What?”

“When are we breaking up?” Dean asked again. “I kinda figured it’d only be harder if we wait till the end of summer.”

Castiel shook his head. “Dean, I thought… I thought we were going to… I don’t understand.”

Dean sighed. “Don’t understand what? You’re leaving, Cas. This is it.”

“Yes, but I thought we were going to sort things out. I thought you wanted to keep this going.”

“I do. You have no idea how much I do,” Dean replied. “But, Cas… That’s what happens, isn’t it? People split up. Things happen, you know? People move on.”

“So you’re moving on?” Castiel asked.

Dean rolled his eyes. “No! No, that’s not what I’m saying. You’re leaving. You’re gonna go out there, meet new people. You know, have an awesome life.”

Then it was Castiel’s turn to huff. “Dean, I want you to be a part of that life. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to make that happen.”

Dean didn’t dare to look at him. “I’m gonna be stuck here while you’re gonna hang out with tons of awesome people and I kinda figured…”

“You figured what? That I would leave you behind and forget about you? That I would just run off and forget all about one of the most important people in my life? You’re unbelievable! Dean, even if we weren’t together, you’re still my best friend. People don’t just forget their best friends.”

Dean sighed, eyes glued to the ground. “Doesn’t matter. Things are gonna end one way or another so it’s best to get it over with and just cut things off already,” he replied quietly.

Castiel shook his head. “Is that what you really want?”

“No, but..”

“No buts, then,” Castiel cut in. “I do not want to break up. If you decide that that’s what you think you really want to do then tell me. Until then we’re staying together. I told you once that you’d be stuck with me.”

Dean half smiled at that. “I’m happy to be stuck with you.”

“Then get those ridiculous thoughts out of your head. Many people have long distance relationships and they turn out just fine. There’s no reason to believe that we couldn’t make this work. We could talk and meet up every few weeks. I’m sure it would be just fine.” Castiel shrugged. “Unless you have other ideas, of course.”

“I’d love for things to work out, believe me, I just don’t want to hold you back, you know? I don’t want to be the reason why you don’t go out there to live your life to the fullest.”

That was enough to make Castiel drop his bottle to the ground. He stood up, stepped over to Dean and kissed him to shut him up.

“Do not ever think you are holding me back, Dean. If anything you give me a reason to move forward. I could spend the next few years just talking to you online if I knew I’d somehow be able to make you happy. I want to be with you. Always.”

Dean didn’t know where to look or what to do at that point so he just stood up and wrapped his arms around Castiel in a tight hug. Cas returned the embrace, letting Dean press his face against Castiel’s shoulder. They stood just like that for a moment.

“Okay,” Dean muttered. “So we’re not breaking up. That’s good. I was so freakin’ worried, Cas. I thought you wanted to break things off and you were just waiting for the right time or whatever.”

“Well, you were wrong. You think too much, Dean. I don’t want us to break up,” Castiel assured, his hand running in soothing circles on Dean’s back.

“Okay,” Dean repeated. He wasn’t quite ready to let it go and calm down about it but he could pretend for Castiel’s sake. “Sorry for making you come out here like this,” he apologized.

“Don’t be. I’m glad we sorted things out. At least for now.” Castiel smiled. “You could just walk me back home and I’d say we’re even.”

Dean felt his lips curl into a smile despite the uneasiness that still sat in the pit of his stomach. “Sounds like a plan. Let’s get going.” He moved back and took Castiel’s hand.

What was left of the beer ended up in the trash. Castiel didn’t turn his flashlight on because he had Dean leading the way. With Dean’s firm grip on his hand, Castiel knew he’d never get lost. Even Dean felt slightly better after their conversation that night and even if he wasn’t completely ready to believe everything would be fine, he was willing to at least try and work it out so his own imagination wouldn’t end up ruining the relationship that him and Castiel shared. It was just too important.

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first thing I've written that's longer than a rp prompt. Let me know if I should try to improve myself at this and maybe try writing something more!  
> No idea how to really make the tags work tbh  
> Not beta'd so all mistakes are my own.


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